Plant pathogens such
as Phytophthora infestans that caused
the Irish Potato Famine continue to threaten local and
global food security. Genetic and chemical plant protection measures
are often overcome by adaptation of pathogen population structures.
Therefore, there is a constant demand for new, consumer- and environment-friendly
plant protection strategies. Metabolic alterations induced by P. infestans in the foliage and tubers of six different
potato cultivars were investigated. Using a combination of untargeted
metabolomics, isolation techniques, and structure elucidation by MS
and 1D/2D-NMR experiments, five steroidal glycoalkaloids, five oxylipins,
and four steroidal saponins were identified. As the steroidal saponins
showed antioomycete but no hemolytic activity, they may thus be considered
as probably safe target substances for enrichment in breeding programs
for disease resistance and as chemical lead structures for the production
of nature-derived synthetic antioomycetes.
Although domesticated potatoes contain a large variety of steroidal glycoalkaloids (SGAs) and saponins, in the past, many research projects mainly focused on the two major SGAs, α-solanine and α-chaconine. This study investigates the quantitative changes, induced by post-harvest LED light exposure, of six SGAs and four saponins in 12 potato cultivars at three different time points (1, 7, and 16 days), by using ultra-performance liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry. Altogether, SGA contents of 3.0−17.1 mg/100 g fresh weight (FW) could be observed in the analyzed tubers with potato varieties highly exceeding the newly discussed safety limit of 10 mg/100 g. The overall contents of 0.1−5.4 mg/100 g FW of the so far barely studied saponins, like protoneodioscin or barogenin-solatrioside, highly differed between the assayed potato cultivars. Furthermore, cultivar-specific regulations of SGAs and saponins could be observed due to light exposure.
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